conversion

I very much enjoy Jewish holidays. It actually pains me that my life my fall is my busiest time at work AND not everyone has it off which means if I take it off I continually have this conversation: Where were you? It was Rosh Hashanah. Oh, you’re Jewish? No, my partner is. So why do you celebrate? An then I get to explain that when someone we loves celebrates something different than us, we’re there to support them because that’s…

Every so often our congregation puts together dinners of different parts of the community. They’re always hosted by someone in the community who cooks up an amazing meal and there’s great conversation. Sometimes they’re just for empty nesters, or our TRIBE group of 20’s and 30’s, families with mitzvah kids in the coming year, and sometimes they’re open to all. I love my TRIBE dinners, but there’s something to be said about the open ones. I say this because…

When I was a full-time, practicing Catholic I my favorite time of year was Lent. I’ll admit, it is odd for someone to say that they love Lent. But as a child I liked the challenge of not doing something I enjoyed. As I got older I enjoyed having that time to reflect on what truly mattered. I also lived for Palm Sunday mass because it was really like a play and I’ve always had a bit of a flair…

We have a really, really great home for our faith. If you’re ever looking for an inclusive Jewish community in north central part of Connecticut, I have a great one! We found it months after moving to Connecticut from college. When we first arrived it had two wonderful, shockingly young, Rabbis. The sweetest Cantor and a community that couldn’t be beat. Three years later, there’s been some changes. One of our Rabbis moved on, our Cantor retired. So now our Rabbis…

With the mikvah postponed until our schedules matched I had time to think and I made a bigger decision than to convert. I decided to not finish my conversion. So close to the finish line, so close to finally being the same. Here’s the truth, the wedding suddenly was coming in under a year. And I started to think about all the changes that were expected of me as a wife. And suddenly, changing my last name to his AND changing…

It really happened because of a wedding invitation. It was beautiful. With their Hebrew names printed below their English ones and the script of Ani L’Dodi, v’Dodi Li on the top. I realized something in that. When J and I got married, I’d be taking that opportunity away from him. His childhood rabbi wouldn’t be able to perform the service, he’d never have his Hebrew name on his wedding invitation. And it was because of me. Since we had already found…